ANALYSIS: A student claims she was assaulted following an argument about the war in Israel – but there are no records to support her claim
Another hate crime allegation by a black Muslim student at the University of Washington appears to lack concrete evidence, following a College Fix investigation.
Isha Hussein claimed that one of her roommates assaulted her last year in November. She began publicizing the allegations around the same time she was running for student government.
However, the University of Washington has no records of an assault in response to a new public records request from The College Fix.
Hussein claimed that assault occurred after a different roommate, who is Jewish, threatened to stab her after a heated argument about the conflict in the Middle East.
The Fix previously determined those claims lacked evidence and police determined there was “no probable cause.”
The Jewish roommate ultimately permanently left university housing due to Hussein’s claims. She had to temporarily leave once the allegations of threats were made. Yet, Hussein still claimed that the university did nothing about the initial incident.
In a letter posted on Instagram, Hussein references an assault in November and a threat in December by her other roommates, in addition to the October 2023 attack. The post received over 43,000 “likes” and garnered widespread online traction, including viral TikTok videos boosting her story.
“Due to [Housing and Food Services] lack of concern for my safety, I was assaulted on the 3rd of November by a different roommate since they were angry that I reported the roommate who threatened me,” Hussein wrote in the post.
The public university told The Fix it has no records of an alleged assault in November 2023.
“I have reached out to the department and they have confirmed that the report previously provided [the October incident] was the only record responsive to this request,” Compliance Analyst Mike Fleming told The Fix via email.
Housing and Food Services deferred to the media relations team for information about the December 2023 claims.
Spokesman Vic Balta reiterated that Hussein did not ask for prosecution, but rather only wanted the October incident “documented.”
“The claims and counterclaims are serious, deeply personal, and have been difficult to verify or resolve for all parties,” Balta told The Fix via email, originally in reference to the October incident. After clarifying the questions were supposed to be about the November claim, he said the same comments applied.
This reporter attempted to follow Hussein on Instagram in order to ask for comment, but the UW student did not accept her follow request. This makes messaging not possible. The College Fix’s Instagram account previously had messaged Hussein for comment on the Oct. 2023 allegation, but she did not respond, and The Fix cannot send another request.
The Fix requested an email and phone number for Hussein, but Balta, the spokesperson, said he has “no information available on this individual.”
The People’s Ticket, which Hussein ran under for student government, did not respond to two Instagram messages from The Fix account sent in the past month that asked for comment and help getting in touch with Hussein.
A prominent pro-Palestinian social media user and former University of Washington student did not respond to requests for comment on Hussein’s story, which he was boosting.
Ahmad Hamdan created a video addressing the alleged incidents involving Hussein and her roommates. His video has nearly 150,000 likes and is still up as of Oct. 22.
Though Hamdan said “more people need to be talking” about what happened to Hussein, he did not respond to Fix questions.
Hamdan did not respond to The Fix‘s email or a TikTok message inquiring whether he had spoken with Hussein or had additional information regarding the alleged November 3 assault.
The student newspaper has yet to update its initial article on the “viral post” despite the police reports being publicly available now for three months. The Fix flagged the reports about the Oct. 2023 incident for The Daily back in July of this year when the first article came out about Hussein’s claims. The student newspaper initially raised concerns about Hussein’s story after she tried to retract an interview and refused to provide documentation supporting her allegations.
MORE: There were 19 campus hate crime hoaxes in 2023
IMAGE: The People’s Ticket/Instagram
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